Kunstkammer
Lismore Castle Arts
22 Mar - 26 Oct 2025
In 2025 Lismore Castle Arts will celebrate 20 years by presenting an exhibition dedicated to the theme of Kunstkammer, curated by art historian & writer, Robert O’Byrne.
Kunstkammer is a form of museum in which strange or rare objects are exhibited together, also known as a Cabinet of Curiosities. Once widespread throughout Europe, these private museums were renowned for featuring a broad range of objects, including Arteficialia (products of man) and Naturalia (products of nature) together with scientific instruments, clocks and automaton.
Priceless works of art were shown alongside strange curiosities, antiquities next to the latest inventions. They were united in their diversity, and their beauty. Kunstkammer at Lismore Castle is both a re-creation and a reinvention of the genre. Through a series of rooms, each one different in size and form, historical objects from private and public collections will share space with works by leading Irish and international contemporary artists.
The exhibition creates new encounters with the familiar and uncanny, inviting timely conversations about display, collections, and contemporary practice as the artefact of the future. Drawing on themes of display the work invites audiences to engage with contemporary art in an accessible way, referring to one of the original ambitions of the Cabinet of Curiosity to foster learning through encounter.
Featured artists:
Aurél, Monster Chetwynd, Dorothy Cross, Urs Fischer, John Gerrard, Graham Gingles, John Kindness, Sarah Lucas, Jonathan Lyndon Chase, Alice Maher, Ed Miliano, Patrick O'Reilly, Peter Pearson, Edward Rollitt, Conrad Shawcross, Sasha Sykes, Joseph Walsh
